What can I expect being an ALT at a senior high school. Any JETs out there that can share their experience with teaching at this level (whats done in class, what your responsibilities are). I will be going to ibaraki prefecture as a prefectural JET likely to be working at high schools. How should I prepare?
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What you may be surpised by is how wide the range of english levels could be a your school/schools. I taught at multiple as a prefectural ALT, and my main school had students who spoke better english than many of my JTE’s, all the way to students who you could still use an Elementary school lesson plan with. I used to have like 3 version of my self intro lesson, depending on the level of the students, and also whether or not the school had a projector.
In terms of responsibilities, it’s going to be up to each JTE you work with. I created lesson plans on my own at my main school (but got feedback from my JTE’s) and graded them myself. I functioned mostly as the lead teacher in these classes. In other schools though I would sometimes just create an activity here and there, all the way to just standing in the corner and reading some sections of textbook for one of my JTE’s at one of my visit schools.
If you wanted to prepare, you could go online and find some lesson plans to get an idea of how to create and adapt various activities, if you are ever asked to create a lesson plan or activity. Lesson plans and games that are easy to change the difficulty of are good ones to have on hand. Also lesson plans that don’t require a lot of extra materials or prep.
Honestly, it depends on a few things:
1) The school level (high level, mid-level, low level): you can google “ibaraki prefecture high school ranking” and view the rankings. If you know your SHS placement you can check out the level for your school even! Some mid and high level school ALTs have T1 responsibilities, some T2, some mostly help out with the varying extracurricular prefectural English Education events (English Debate, speech competitions, etc.) and there might be some who don’t really do much else besides helping with grading/testing periods. It honestly depends on the school, their curriculum and whatever they’re trying to achieve. Some senior high schools are general academic, Super Global (usually have an International Course), Super Science or might be vocationally oriented (commercial, agricultural, etc.) The more academic schools usually are more focused on making sure they prepare students for the entrance exams so again even the high schools are all different. Low level schools are a mixed bag; most of these students don’t usually go straight to college like the kids at mid and high level schools – they start working right after high school graduation as salarymen and office ladies, factory workers, etc. So they’re usually less academic, but the students can be a mixed bag of amazing, chill, motivated, unmotivated and all that.
Personally I’m T1 at my school, which is an upper mid-level school and I have a lot of responsibility as an ALT. My teachers depend on me a lot for TT lessons and I also run some speech planning and preparations. I’m also in charge of running the English/International Culture Club so I lead, plan and organize every meeting’s activities. This might be similar or different at your school. I usually plan two or so weeks of lessons and make my own materials for Grades 1-3 (most schools have a printing room) and do a bunch of other stuff for proficiency tests like EIKEN and GTEC.
2) what your JTEs expect/want you to do in TT classes – Your predecessor will probably be in touch somehow and they’ll let you know what your role entails and what your office will be like. And then you get to your placement, one of the first things you should do is talk to your JTEs in one-on-one on what kind of expectations they have of your lessons and what goals they would like you to accomplish in your TT classes. I’ve realized they all have their own ways of teaching so it helps to figure out what each of them want, but your predecessor guide should have a lot of information for you as well. You might be better off getting the really gritty info on the students’ levels and your JTEs from your predecessor. When I got here I decided to focus more on production (getting students to apply their four skills in communicative lessons) based on my predecessor guide. Japanese students don’t have many chances to use English in real-time. They know a lot of grammar but they need creative ways to apply it and to develop spontaneous abilities to have a conversation and communicate. Don’t be surprised if they tell you “Anything is OK!” Which is ultimately amazing and the scariest thing they can say when you come from a non-teaching background. What lesson plans you do will ultimately depend on the school level and the level of your students. That Tofugu link is great and I’ve used a lesson there for my students once but I mostly create my own lessons because my kids have an array of interests and I like to create lessons that capture that so they can talk about them and draw from their real-life experiences, opinions on social problems, etc.
I also recommend ALTopedia, ALT Insider, ISLCollective and any JET/AJET Teaching Resources. You can find the latter stuff in the Tofugu link! They’re pretty helpful.
3) How open-minded and adaptable you can be! I’ve found that these are two qualities you need to be able to have. Japan has a unique social and cultural ethos around learning English, which is to say that even after years and years, even JTEs who have been doing this job for years still find it difficult to communicate effectively and coherently. I have some kids who can communicate better and more coherently than JTEs I’ve worked with. Levels vary between class years and in classes of a similar year. Finding that sweet spot can be pretty challenging at first but all the JET/AJET Teaching Resources can really help! When you get here it’ll take a while to get this but you’ll have to think about how slow/fast to speak and how loud your voice needs to be for your students and your JTEs because they speak English as a foreign language. It’s always good to approach things from the open to everything route because you’ll be in a new country. You’ll probably be surprised by how low the level of English is but just remember that Japanese and English are on wildly opposite ends of the language family tree. Also, Japanese people are shy so don’t be surprised if your JTEs are shy. As a shy person, I kind of had to break it so that I could do relationships. And then lastly about the adaptability part – your JTEs will be busy, like so busy they might forget about TT classes, forget they changed your class with a teacher who requested it, forget to bring you with them to classes – you get what I mean. Many of them are homeroom teachers which has way bigger culturally visible responsibilities than in your home country, they also run after school clubs and they probably have Saturday classes if they’re teaching Year 3 students. Always initiate contact/communication at your base school about classes, lesson plans. Don’t depend on them to come to you first because they’re too busy to even think about it, especially if you are T1z Visit schools will either send you the lesson in advance or prepare the plan and materials for you in advance. Double check and triple check if you need to. Always have a backup lesson (ALTopedia is the bomb dot come for those). And even if your classrooms have Internet, make a backup plan for what to do if the Internet goes – again ALTopedia is everything! Games are good for that!
All in all it’s a great experience. Just keep an open mind and be gentle with your learning process. I’m an ALT in Ibaraki too; it’s a great prefecture to live and work in so I’m excited to hear you’re coming this side!
Hey! I was an Ibaraki SHS JET! If you’re gonna be based in Mito, send me a DM and I might be able to tell you about your specific schools if I know them.
Other people here are right though, English level varies wildly between schools. Some schools you’ll be teaching debate, doing cultural lessons in English, and tons of university entrance prep; other schools you’ll have kids who still don’t fully know the alphabet, and can’t hold any kind of unguided conversation beyond “how are you?”
It’s really hard to prepare effectively. One thing that is true though is that you really, really don’t need to do any prep before you go to Japan. Honestly. At the very most, make a self-introduction quiz lesson. Schools will either have specific expectations of you, in which case they’ll let you know when you get there; or they won’t, and you can do almost whatever you want.
I think the other replies did a great job explaining the jist of it.
The only thing that I’ll add is that as of this year, the 1st year SHS students should be receiving their own device (iPad, laptop, etc.). If you can, you might want to brainstorm different ways to use this in class.
Unfortunately tech in the class was pretty uncommon for 99% of the JET program’s history, so you won’t find many JETs talking about it. However, there are tons of sites, activities, games online that would fit well in most classes.
Prepare to be unprepared. Seriously, high school is the most… varied experience you can have.
You may have high-level academic students.
You may have mid-level students.
You may have students who are studying to do a vocation after high school, such as appliance repair.
You may have students who are studying to become farmers after high school.
You may have special ed students.
You may have “distance learning” students.
You may have all of the above. Just try to be flexible, and take whatever your JTE says about the students as equal parts likely to be true/likely to be absolute BS until you get into the class.
Very old information (96-99 Senior High School ALT) but I imagine a few things haven’t changed.
My base school was of a high academic level with most kids going on to university. I was only regularly allowed to teach first years as back then English oral communication was irrelevant to university admission. This may have changed. Kids were great, but you could sense the stress level in them. The baseball team was high level (Koshien the year before I arrived) and would be sleeping in class because they were up working out so early.
My other school (since bulldozed if Google Maps is accurate) was the lowest academic level in the Ken. Nobody was going to university and a small handful might have gone on to community college (don’t recall the exact name). Zero pressure and the kids thought learning to speak English was hilarious which made it all easy for me.
Note that the academic ‘level’ of the school was determined by the entrance exam. At the low level school I taught one girl who was extremely sharp but had been involved in a road traffic accident that had hospitalized her in her last year of junior high. This set her back academically and she wasn’t able to get the grades that would have gotten her into a higher level school. No second chances on that test. I also taught a boy with developmental disabilities – I’m guessing Asperger’s – who was also extremely gifted for languages and desperate to speak English to a foreigner. As a 21 year old ALT I had no idea how to work with him. None of the qualified teachers at the school seemed interested in him, so it was always a tough situation.
Biggest surprise for me was that some of the JTEs I worked with (at both schools) had very poor English language skills. There were a couple classes in which I completely took the lead and had to help cover up the JTE’s inability to speak English. I also solo taught on a few occasions which was extremely fun.
I’m a current Ibaraki SHS ALT! Answers vary like everyone has said. Some people are teaching fun cultural lessons or simple games while others (like me) teach from the textbook. One standard thing tho is that most, if not all of us, are teaching the lessons/activity for the entire lesson period. I have about 3-4 classes per day at my schools while some friends have more. You won’t know what your school expects from you until you arrive. I started off teaching more cultural-based lessons but now I’m more textbook with a sprinkle of culture. But others create activities or games to reinforce the students English.
High schools in Japan fall into a few different categories. There are high schools for trade, business, agriculture, special needs and of course, college entry. I can tell you you’ll almost certainly be teaching 45-50 minute long classes, 1 to 4 per day, to groups of teenagers. Aside from that everything is pretty up in the air regarding level, test prep, lesson plans, etc.
Have you talked to your pred yet? They’ll be the most helpful here.
**2yr SHS Direct Hire ALT here:** There will be busy periods and slow periods.
The SHS yearly schedule is all over the shop, with tests, special events, parent teacher meetings, school festival etc. . .
During the slow periods, take a moment to catch your breath but use this time to prepare.
**Schedule:** I teach 17 classes a week (55mins) plus English Club after school once a week.
I’m at my base school every day and go to my visit school in the afternoons twice a week.
I visit a special needs school twice a month and spend the whole day there. Special needs schools typically are all 12 grades of education under one roof.
**Planning:** Will depend not only on each school but the teacher of each class. I have one teacher that uses me as a tape recorder (I like it, zero stress/pressure lesson). All the others I plan 100% and lead. Some teachers sleep during those classes, some help confirm understanding in Japanese to the students when its needed. Some aren’t even present.
I rotate between conversation lessons, grammar, research and presentations, short response writing and cultural lessons if I can teach something parallel to the text book content.
To be honest, I feel like there is not enough time to be creating all my own materials(Unless I work heaps of overtime) Maybe I could manage my time better but its kinda hectic.
Feels like I’m used to pad out the textbook lessons so JTE’s don’t breeze though the textbook too quickly. Sorry got a little ranty towards the end…